How Moral Appraisals Operate in Sticky Crises: Exploring the Distinction between Moral Outrage and Empathic Anger within the Triadic Appraisal Framework of Situational Crisis Communication Theory

Rongting Niu (Ph.D. Student) and Nicholas Eng. "How Moral Appraisals Operate in Sticky Crises: Exploring the Distinction between Moral Outrage and Empathic Anger within the Triadic Appraisal Framework of Situational Crisis Communication Theory," paper to be presented at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Conference, August, San Francisco.

Abstract: This study expands the triadic appraisal framework of situational crisis communication theory (SCCT) with a 3 (crisis type: human error vs. management misconduct vs. scansis) × 2 (information-giving strategy type: instructing vs. adjusting) between-subjects experiment among U.S. adults (N = 482). The findings support Coombs and Tachkova’s (2023) framework, which positions moral outrage as a third factor that stakeholders use to assess crisis threats within SCCT. Moral outrage and empathetic anger were found to be distinct types of third-party anger driven by different psychological triggers. Notably, the adjusting strategy led to significantly lower organizational reputation damage than the instructing strategy in the management misconduct crisis type, but not in the crisis type of human error crisis or scansis. Additionally, the study examined the impact of organizational crisis response strategies on participants’ punishment intentions in different forms, including negative word-of-mouth (NWOM), boycott, and brand cancellation intentions. Theoretical and practical implications were discussed.